


Galaxies In Orbit (A Universal Pull)

by The_Hunter_Nightingale



Category: NieR: Automata (Video Game), Persona 3, Persona Series, RWBY
Genre: Blood and Violence, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Death, Depression, Existentialism, F/F, F/M, God Complex, Hate Crimes, Homophobia, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Suicidal Thoughts, Unhealthy Relationships
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-22
Updated: 2018-10-22
Packaged: 2019-08-05 20:11:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,722
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16374266
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Hunter_Nightingale/pseuds/The_Hunter_Nightingale
Summary: It was only a matter of time before the Universe went to Minako's head, only a matter of time before the seal was no longer needed and faded, setting her free.It was only a matter of time before Humanity was destroyed, before others ruled the earth.And she was left alone, just her and the Universe.





	Galaxies In Orbit (A Universal Pull)

**Author's Note:**

> This will be an epic-length story; one that will hopefully span hundreds of chapters, and will contain hundreds of thousands of words. That said, I'm not skimping out on word count per chapter: no less than 3,000 words per chapter.
> 
> Just a fair warning to all involved; this story isn't about happiness or fighting for justice or any other typical themes associated with RWBY and Persona.
> 
> This story is more about existentialism, homophobia, suicidal thoughts/tendencies, NieR's twisted brand of morality, sociopathic thought processes, RWBY's dark world made much, much darker, 'good' people are nonexistent, hate crimes, racism, everyone is a bad person to someone else, blood, gore, death, searing, violence beyond that of normal canon violence, a twist on Persona lore and how personae are formed, the origin of Grimm tinkered with, YorHa will do ANYTHING to keep humans safe from machines, A2 has PTSD more prevalent than in canon, 2B has existential thoughts and wishes to die, 9S is just...there,machines are more human than androids sometimes. Minako suffers from crippling depression and seeks suicide via combat ...
> 
> ...yeah, it's got it all. 
> 
> Because this story is so large, however, there are some matters that must be addressed. First, this story follows Minako and the main characters ONLY, rarely ever will it stray from that. Second, it will take a while for the story to pick up properly, so the first fifty or so chapters alone will be spent in the RWBYverse.
> 
> The story will be THAT big...
> 
> For anyone wondering about those little snippet stories don't worry - they'll be getting updated soon, but this will be priority. 
> 
> As the story progresses there will be new tags added in, so don't worry about how bare it is right now.
> 
> with that done, enjoy.

Eyes watered but nothing fell from them, skin cracked but never blistered, heat burned but never harmed. A quick testing of the chains around her ankles and wrists supplied to her the knowledge that her shackles were worn and weakened.

So was she, so in that regard there was nothing about her ‘imprisonment’ that was going to change any time soon. The door was no longer a door but a wall; rotted metal mixing with moss-brick and wooden beams spread in an endless criss-cross above. It had been…too long since she’d been here, her position a reminder that self-sacrifice for the greater good would only lead to torment and torture.

Nyx was silent; ever since the door became a wall and the cross became shackles the being had been. A god of no equal yet compassionate and apathetic in equal measure. Really, the being had taken to talking to its jailor to pass time with another. To learn, seeing as it’d slept for eons, of humanity’s ups and downs. Of what humanity was; what it had turned out to be since the beginning of its sleep.

The jailor now imprisoned with it, Nyx could only feel pity – apathy would get it nowhere in the long run, and a being with the knowledge of a dead age could see that change within its emotional faculties was required for continued survival against whatever threatened its ‘warden’. Its warden, however, became disillusioned as any would when the people she gave up everything for forgot about her.

All except for the curious android with a soul; that mechanical wonder was never aging and never forgot anything – unshackled by time, the robot travelled through the Velvet Room. With the aid of its inhabitants the machine found its way into the Sea of Souls; or, on the boundary anyway.

It found them both, she a door, it a prisoner behind said door. The machine found its way over to the warden, apologised for the way their other friends – now long dead and dusted by time – acted and vowed to never forget.

To never leave.

And so, like Nyx and the warden, it slept; eyes wide but empty of anything indicating life; soul powered by the warden’s control over the universe. While the weapons within the being may have rusted to uselessness its combat skills were never-aging – so when the time came for the Sea of Souls to never be needed in this world, and the wall broke down from uselessness, the machine would be there to protect them as it promised.

Nyx shared its prison with its warden, and just outside slept a machine dedicated to the warden’s very soul – a girl that grew with death from the tender age of ten, an apathetic girl that made friends from nothing only to give them all up for the world. Given everything, yet the warden threw it all away for the chance that her species would live on.

If there was ever a person Nyx admired and respected more it’d not seen them. It’d not seen them climb its tower of Tartarus, it had not seen them fend of hordes of bloodthirsty Shadows by themselves while their teammates lay broken behind, whimpering like cowards. It had never seen a soul like Minako Arisato, and nor would it ever, for there would only be one Messiah to it.

Of course, the Persona forged from mankind’s memory of Jesus Christ was aptly named ‘Messiah’, but a Persona saved nothing while Minako saved _everything_.

A memory saved humanity from itself; Minako saved humanity from the very universe. From an endless Sea of Souls, from a deity of incomprehensible power.

The True Messiah was Nyx’s warden, and the Messiah’s protector lay just outside.

Nyx would be happy with the arrangement were it not for its warden’s distress, loneliness and debilitating wish for it all _to just end_ …

Death would, of course, never take the warden; the very universe rested within her heart and her veins replaced blood with liquid power. In the case of being on a scale to Nyx Minako could force it into a standstill. That was another reason the deific being admired its warden.

Within the seal, the ‘wall’, was where it resided, but even if sealed it was a being of utmost power – nothing could force it to live outside of anything but luxury. A seal powered by the most powerful human in all of existence could have, but thankfully for Nyx its warden didn’t really care. Just as long as the world didn’t end, she was okay with leaving Nyx to its own devices.

The warden’s point of view on the whole thing consisted of three things; a sacrifice was in vain, an existence was forever ruined, a world was saved. Aigis awaited her awakening just outside, the android’s synthetic heart only ever beat for her continued existence, so it didn’t really shock her as much as Minako thought it would.

 Of course, Aigis was literally the only thing keeping her from dissolving the seal and freeing herself – with the power of the Universe Arcana she could turn any miracle into reality, any idea into fact.

It would be child’s play to leave the seal but doing so would release Nyx and the few remaining Shadows locked behind. It didn’t matter for her to wait just a little bit more, anyway; the Shadows were dying off as humanity forgot about their myths and their legends, of their deeds and stories. They died off as they were no longer needed, and only those locked within Minako’s personal Sea of Souls were spared.

She would never forget their tumultuous climb through Tartarus, the times she nearly died only for one to will themselves into existence and save her.

She would never forget the moment she realised Personae could communicate with their summoner.

She would never forget the late-night chats with the surprisingly laid-back Gabriel, or the cheerful yet mischievous Nekomata. The times she cried because Tartarus was _just too much_ and Kikuri-Hime comforted her, the times her anger got the best of her and Pixie calmed her down, the days she’d go without sleep and Alice would hum a song for her; there was just something about childish innocence woven into a tune that set her at ease.

She would never forget them, any of them. Their legends, their tales, what they’ve done for her and what she’s done for them.

None of it.

So, she bent the Universe to her will, twisted it until it nearly snapped, until Nyx began worrying for its own safety within its prison; but she’d done it. She’d forged a Sea of Souls within for her own Personae so that when the time came to free herself, for Aigis to make good on her promises, Minako would at least have something to keep her grounded.

Something to keep her protected as well, but mostly grounded.

As the seal she’d never dreamt; years and eons had passed and never had she experienced a memory in the whimsical forms sleep was oft to twist them into; Hypnos had never mercifully taken her into his arms before, even Aigis knew what a dream was and how to experience one.

Minako had never felt the lull of a dream, though, and Thanatos did all he could to help her sleep; once she’d acquire Alice Thanatos left the job to her, and instead decided to simply keep watch, wait, and react when the time came. When his beloved master was free he could continue doing what Death did best.

When the seal changed, Minako had experienced what could only amount to ‘dreaming’; old memories of friends she can’t remember the faces of, of places with names but no description. So out of desperation to keep whatever memories she had of back then pure and unmodified by the state of dreaming, she never slept since.

It’s been millions of years, but Minako would never know that; time flowed differently, so what felt like a trillion years could have very well been quadruple that. Aigis, the Shadow Hunting Android with a synthetic heart, was built to last – by the Kirijo Group’s scientists’ guesses – a good million years before the synthetic oil within her body began to cease flowing. It was akin to a woman dying of old age, her body slowly but surely shutting down from within. Of course, Aigis could just wake up and send herself into that Orgia Mode that she so loved to use, heating up the oil and living for a million years more.

Chained to a wall, arms paper-thin and muscle that wasn’t there in the first place atrophied, all she could do was stare into the abyss and hope something stared back. Anything would do.

Anything to break the silence.

Looking down from her chained position the Messiah of Earth blinked, the first movement she’s made in a _very long time_. Her eyes shifted from where she knew Aigis had propped herself while she ‘slept’, to where the android was now.

Stood up.

With her hands clenched in fists, head forward into the abyss she stared into.

As though she were about to fight someone.

Minako was about to call Aigis off, when a growl came from the shadows, soft _thunks_ of footsteps; movement, that was not her own or Aigis’, in the realm of the seal? In the seat of the universe? Perhaps Elizabeth had come to visit, or perhaps even her estranged brother Theodore – it has been quite a while, though, since either Velvet Room Attendant found the time to visit for more than a couple of minutes, and it was only once every thousand years or so. While Minako was obviously their favourite – and Igor would never admit it, but she was his, too – they had other ‘guests’ to deal with throughout time, and while for her time and space had no meaning, the Velvet Room didn’t even technically exist in time and space. Just between it.

With that in mind it did kind of shock her to see a humanoid _thing_ walk out of the shadows. Eyes red, back hunched, snou-wait…snout? Claws, fangs, red eyes, snout, tail, black fur…

“A…werewolf?”

Aigis was always good at asking the questions Minako couldn’t; mostly because she was either too busy staving off her almost narcoleptic need to sleep, or practically training until her legs turned to jelly. Apparently, the robotic woman also managed to add confusion to her tone, because that was _also_ exactly what Minako was feeling. It was only two more ‘years’ now until the Sea of Souls emptied, and she could free herself from the seal with no chance of Nyx being released. Two years until the world was permanently safe from Nyx and Erebus – a creature that, as soon as the Shadows started dying out, simply ceased to be.

It was as though all purpose Erebus had died when the Shadows began to vanish. With them being the manifestation of human will and imagination, and Erebus being the harbinger of all things humankind wished for, what did that say about the current state of humanity? Either they had evolved past their base need and want for death…or death was so commonplace they didn’t care for destruction anymore. Only survival.

As in response to Aigis’ disbelief the creature growled. She raised her fist to destroy it when it just…popped out of existence.

Just like that.

There were no ‘holy words’, nothing spoken, no hand moved, no breath whispered. No whimper from the animal, no flash of light or loud noise. It simply ceased to be, desisted its own existence and submitted to the very power of the universe. Every star, every galaxy, every dead sun and every dying planet. Every single atom within the universe bent itself to the will of the Messiah, and with nary a thought the Messiah had willed the creature to simply cease existence.

It didn’t die, no, for such a base form of erasure could not fit the overkill-attitude that Minako had always had. No, it did not die, and when the words ‘ceased to be’ are used to describe the event it was just that.

Minako rewrote time and space itself to make the creature cease.

As in, she made it so that the being never lived in the first place, therefore never got to be there.

With a _thought_.

There were more that appeared – Aigis tapped into her memory banks of Earth’s standard brown wolves and their pack intelligence, along with strategies and tips on the off chance these followed the same mentality. Usually wolves never travelled alone, especially when hunting, and these seemed to be the same in that regard.

Of course, there was the lingering question of ‘how did these creatures get inside the protected little dimensional bubble that is the seal’s location without the sheer power of the Universe Arcana tearing them apart at the seams’? there was also the question of ‘why were they not attacking’?

Minako stared in the abyss that surrounded them, a sea of red eyes and black fangs, white masks and claws. Not all were bipedal wolves; some looked like bears that were dipped in ink and given bone armour, some looked like mutated lizards with spiked heads, others like giant two-headed snakes. Myriad different beings surrounding them both, all with the ability to tear Aigis in two were she a normal person.

None of them made a single move.

Aigis’ hands creaked from the effort of her straining fists, the very metal groaning in anticipation to be buried within one of these monstrous creatures. Her eyes narrowed, and her feet adopted a narrower stance on the off chance that they got the drop on her and she would be forced to defend.

Minako, meanwhile, contemplated simply leaving the seal now; it would be far better than watching her aegis, so to speak, tear them all apart. It was so very tempting, but something caught her eye, something in the abyss.

So, she stared deep into that inky black, that dark ebony. She stared deep and long and hard. Deep into the writhing shadows and coiling darkness, well past the small flickers of light into the nothingness.

For the first time since being here, since being strung up on the door and chained to the wall, Minako stared straight into the abyss, deeper than she had ever before.

Revering red eyes framed by pale white skin, cracked with black veins, stared back.

* * *

 

The being stepped forward eventually.

Two normal years had passed of their strange stare-down with the black creatures that did nothing, the standoff that led to nought more than wasted time. Neither side would do anything to the other, and over the two years they’d been there both sides relaxed.

The creatures, lupine in nature, went from growling and stalking around to whining out and playfully rolling with each other. The snakes simply coiled around themselves, forming an intricate knot that could be undone in a second, a tangle of snake heads, scales and forked hissing tongues. The bears went from menacingly standing on their hind legs to sitting as a dog would, awaiting an order from its master; and the avian variety of these strange black creatures decided to do something unprecedented.

Even for Minako.

They went from circling around overhead, hellish caws and nightmarishly black talons, to perching themselves on the criss-crossing beams overhead that expanded into nothingness. And sat there. Doing whatever it is birds do.

Being tall and draped in black was the first thing she noticed; pale skin about as pale as her own, with black rings circling red glowing eyes and pitch veins bulged and showing around her temples. _Her_ , was another thing Minako noticed about the stranger. She’d expected a male draped in an all-black cloak, eyes glowing from some ominous shadow that seemed to hang around him like a fog while his hands were clawed, and his body oozed evil.

This woman in front of her was nothing like she’d expected; a kind smile etched onto ivory white skin with pale lips and black veins. Red eyes that shone with something she’d never seen before, bare feet tipped with black nails and pale hands the same as her feet. An aura of sheer apathy emanated from her, the kind those with plots bigger than they themselves were held around them. The kind those with minions to help achieve those plots held.

Aigis shifted her sights from the unknown woman to Minako, a question died when Minako simply nodded; all was well, even if her sensors told her the monsters were unnatural. Aigis lowered her fists, raised her back, and ran one of her self-diagnostic subroutines while she waited.

The woman looked at the awaiting android-woman with curiosity, but soon dismissed her when Minako’s shackles shifted slightly.

“You sit at the foot of the universe, Unknown.” Minako hadn’t spoken for years, decades, eras and eons. Her voice unused sounded scratchy, but her irritation hidden beneath a façade of apathy was never heard. Instead the raw power of Nyx’s presence, coupled with the Universe Arcana, gave her every breath a deific quality. “You stare at the Warden, Keeper of the Gate of Nyx, Minako Arisato.”

Aigis introduced herself next, following in line with her only friend and the only person she’d kneel for. She’d die for Minako, her loyalty ran that deep.

“Aigis, Aegis of The Messiah.” A new title befitting of Minako’s.

Every word shook the Unknown’s body with spasms of _sheer power_. Minako knew what it felt like – to stare at a god with enough power to _think_ something out of existence. Every bone snapped and shifted, yet no pain was felt; just an insurmountable pressure that squeezed the very soul. That pressed down on your spirit and made sure you knew the god in front of you was _real_.

The woman could feel the power, of course, which made Minako respect her fortitude when the only thing even hinting towards being affected by her presence was the slight stutter in the Unknown’s words.

“I-I am Salem, Queen of Grimm, Daughter of the Moon.”

Minako was silent for a very long time after that; the Universe provided her with knowledge on Salem, who she was, what she wanted, why she was here; everything from Ozpin to the Maidens, Grimm to Hunters. Everything was known by her, and when the last dregs of knowledge seeped into her expansive mind, she was suddenly interested.

“Salem…”

The woman in question nodded, her smile wider than she thought could be possible; of course, it was a small line slightly curved upwards but it was as wide as she'd be able to smile. Ozpin had shared her vision of peace through fear once, contributed to it even, but he’d grown soft and misguided, complacent and weak. He’d turned from powerful friend to stalwart enemy in just a thousand years. The ‘Brother Gods’ felt fit to curse Ozpin with reincarnation for something or other – most likely for failing to end her plans of world peace via fear.

“I…was brought here by a woman in blue, who told me I’d very much like to meet you.”

“A Guest?” Minako was silent for a second, thoughts moving about faster than humanly possible. “No, but someone of enough interest to be brought to me.”

Salem again nodded.

“You are dark yet with good intentions, you kill to save, you burn to preserve.”

“Are you proud?”

Minako blinked in surprise; Salem’s voice was shuttered, her power making it so, but her tone held a hint of nervousness. As though her being proud was important.

“You wish for peace?”

A nod.

“Then yes.”

Salem smiled a little more, noticing the confusion on Minako’s face. Even gods knew not everything, especially when they were sealed as a gate – then shackled to a wall – to keep another god locked away.

“You are blind in this scenario; you know nothing of who I am beyond what I’ve done and my name.”

Minako, in turn, nodded with a tilted head to the side. “Of course, sealed away as I am. But there are some things deduction can grant me.” Minako’s shackles shattered into ethereal blue particles, her body lowering itself to the ground gently while Nyx’s face appeared in dark wisps behind her. Towering a full body above her, Nyx’s blank grinning mask stared into Salem’s red eyes.

Minako waved a hand and a chair materialised behind her, right next to the one behind her, and one in front of her.

Seating herself in the chair, Nyx’s ethereal body behind her, Aigis now seated next to her, Minako waved at the chair in front of her.

“Come, tell me how your world fairs.”

Salem blinked. it had been  _years_ since she was ever invited to sit with someone, and it had been never since she was asked to sit with a  _god_. 

 When that blue woman showed up in her black castle smiling and waving to her cohorts and cheerfully proclaiming that someone was  _very_ interested in meeting her, Salem was...apprehensive. 

You don't just  _get_ invites from godly beings, after all; especially not the Messiah herself, and definitely not for a Grimm Queen such as herself. If anything she's surprised cults haven't risen up in The Messiah's name to 'purge the world of anything threatening humanity'. It was, after all, what the Messiah had done back then - caged a god, defeated death itself, commanded an army of legends to fight the Shadows of humanity...feats no normal person could or would achieve.

"You wish to know of the world you left behind?" She'd been in awe at this being in front of her, blinded and deafened by her power. The spell wore off, the curse was broken. She was no longer in awe and stared at the emaciated form of the Messiah, surrounded by Grimm, sat on a chair.

Salem stared into Minako's eyes and stared deeper still, past the windows into the soul.

The Universe stared back. The awe came back, twice as powerful as before nearly bucking her knees from under her, so she covered it up by sitting on the offered chair.

And she spoke. "The world is known as Remnant..."


End file.
